Othello

Summary

1950 BBC live studio production of Shakespeare’s tragedy Othello.

Theatre play

Othello by William Shakespeare [more information]

Play synopsis

'Othello the Moor, a general employed by the Venetian state, has secretly married Desdemona, a daughter of the senator Brabantio. Iago, an ensign nursing resentment against Othello, enlists the help of Rodorigo, a disappointed suitor of Desdemona. They wake Brabantio in the middle of the night with the news of his daughter’s elopement. Brabantio takes the case to the senate where, learning that she has married Othello of her own accord, he disowns his daughter. Othello is immediately ordered to the Venetian colony of Cyprus to repel a threatened Turkish invasion. Desdemona sails with her husband, taking with them her companion Emilia, who is also Iago’s wife, and Othello’s lieutenant Michael Cassio, newly promoted over Iago’s head. Once in Cyprus, Iago plants the suspicion in Othello’s mind that Desdemona has been unfaithful to him with Cassio. He engineers a drunken brawl for which Cassio is blamed and dismissed by Othello. Desdemona intercedes on Cassio’s behalf but her constant pleas to Othello for his reinstatement only serve to convince Othello that Cassio is her lover. Iago acquires a treasured handkerchief that belonged to Desdemona and uses it as proof of the affair. Increasingly maddened by jealousy, Othello orders Iago to kill Cassio and strangles Desdemona himself. Emilia discloses her husband’s plot and Othello, tormented by grief and remorse, kills himself. Iago, after murdering his own wife, is left to the justice of the Venetian state’. (Source: http://www.rscshakespeare.co.uk/othello.html, accessed 6 November 2012.)

Production history

Written c. 1603 and the first known performance occurred on 1 November 1604 at Whitehall Palace in London. (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Othello#Performance_history.)

Date of transmission

Sunday 23 April 1950

Time

8.30-10.45pm

Channel

BBC Television

Production company

BBC

Credits

Producer

George More O’Ferrall (1907-1982)

Playwright

William Shakespeare

Music

Clifton Parker

Sets / Settings

Barry Learoyd

Associate Producer

Kevin Sheldon

Cast

Pamela Arliss	Bianca
David Askey	Third Gentleman
John Benson	Second Gentleman
John Biggerstaff	Messenger
Frank Birch	Brabantio
Bryan Coleman	Montano
Charles Doran	A Senator
Dennis Harkin	First Gentleman
Laurence Harvey	Cassio
Joan Hopkins	Desdemona
Kenneth MacLeod	Herald
Patrick Macnee	Lodovico
André Morell	Othello
Stephen Murray	Iago
Margaretta Scott	Emilia
George Skillan	Gratiano
Alan Wheatley	Roderigo
Donovan Winter	Sailor
Arthur Wontner	Duke of Venice

Additional details

Origination

Live from studio

Vision original

Monochrome

Later transmissions

Presented again at 8.00pm on Thursday 27 April 1950.

Extant status

No archival copy is known to exist.

Play tags

class issues / differences; race relations; tragedy

Print sources

Title

Othello (Website: database)

Author/creator

BUFVC

Reference

http://bufvc.ac.uk/shakespeare/index.php/title/av37360

Title

Radio Times, 21 April 1950 (Magazine)

Linking notes

listing, p. 44; article by Lionel Hale, ‘A Play Bursting with Energy’, p. 43